In stage performances, a performer should ideally be lit from multiple angles to minimize shadows including, for example, a front angle, a left-side angle, a right-side angle and a rear angle. Therefore, each performer would ideally have several lights directed towards them.
As a performer moves about the stage, these lights need to be moved in order to continue to illuminate the performer from these various angles. Such light sources are used to illuminate a moving performer. Each light source, where that light source is manually operated, will require one operator. The operator must typically be versed in the performer's movements and be vigilant to move the light source in coordination with the performer's movements. When lighting a performer from four angles, for example, and using the key lighting method, four operators are needed to illuminate each performer. As there could be several performers onstage at the same time, theoretically this would require tens of operators to be positioned in areas above the stage and in areas surrounding the stage area in order to operate all of the light sources. This is not practical and oftentimes there is only enough space for approximately six operators, even in the large theatres, who then must divide their time between operating different spotlights which are focused on different performers at different times during the performance. This is undesirable as the lighting of the performers will be sub-optimal and therefore will impact on the overall performance. For a number of years now fully automated spotlight systems have been known. Such a fully automated spotlight systems typically use radio frequency (RF) transmitters which are worn by each of the performers in order to triangulate a performer's position on the stage. Several RF receivers positioned about the edges of the stage are used to calculate the performer's approximate position on the stage by determining the strengths of the RF signal received at the RF receivers. It will be appreciated that such systems are prone to error as the accuracy of RF triangulation is not precise enough to capture small movements by the performers.
Further developments of such fully automated systems have incorporated infrared (IR) transmitters and IR receivers in order to better determine the position of the performers on the stage. Such IR-based systems are more accurate than the RF-only systems but the IR-based systems still use the RF transmitter and receivers as the primary means of performance position determination. In these IR systems, the IR transmitter and IR receiver are used as a secondary positioning system to further refine the determination of the performer's position and the IR transmitter and receiver system is also used as a backup in the case that the RF system is not operating correctly.
More recently, such fully automated systems have incorporated gyroscopes into the units that are worn by the performers in order to assist with understanding whether a performer has moved slightly in one direction, or if the performer has moved to a kneeling or prone position on the stage. Such small movement can be detected using the gyroscope, but the accuracy is not perfect and there remain issues with these types of prior art systems as discussed further hereinbelow.
Nonetheless there are still issues with these fully automated systems. For example, should a performer raised a hand to display an object, the position of the performer on the stage will not have changed however it would be best if the spot lighting could be moved slightly upwardly to better illuminate the performer's raised hand so that the audience could clearly see the object held aloft. In other circumstances, the performer may lean slightly to the left or to the right such that the performer's head may move out of the beam of the light source, but the performer's waist may not have moved as they are only leaning. In this scenario, the fully automated systems may not be able to detect such movement and will not move the lights accordingly. In situations where the performer has only changed position to a small degree, fully automated spotlight systems will not have the ability to recognise or detect all of these movements and hence will not be able to move the spotlights in the appropriate manner so as to illuminate the performer correctly.
Furthermore, in other scenarios it is desirable to light specific areas of the stage at specific points even if there is no performer in the vicinity of that stage point at that time. With the fully automated systems which rely on the presence of an RF signal and/or an IR signal, it is not possible to do so. It would be necessary in such scenarios to have a dedicated light which is directed towards that area of the stage which can then be switched on and switched off as needs be during the performance. For the remaining portion of the performance this dedicated light would not be used which is an inefficient use of the lighting resources.
It can be seen that lighting a stage during a performance can be viewed as an art form which is best carried out by a human operator. However, to operate all of the required lights in a fully manually operated system is very difficult from the point of view of having enough space in the area surrounding the stage, and, even if it were possible to position enough operators in the area surrounding the stage, the costs to do so would be quite high.
It is a goal of the present invention to provide a method and system that overcomes at least one of the above mentioned problems. In particular, it is desirable to provide a system which will allow the input of a human operator to take cognisance of minor movements of performers on the stage and introduce a human input to the movement of the lights, whilst at the same time allowing a single operator to operate a plurality of the spotlights concurrently.